“Mouse”: Knowing What’s in your OS

Microsoft Windows Operating System (OS) platform comes with bundled software.This software is designed to work with your operating system (OS) and provide the maximum performance.Taking time to see what programs are bundled in your operating system can save you money.I am speaking solely about Microsoft bundled programs not the additional in most cases not needed software that is added by the computer manufacture.It will be distinguished by their brand name logo because they are so proud to have added this additional software that might already be installed by Microsoft.This is called third party software. Defined by WkipideA: “In computer programming, a third-party software component is a reusable software component developed to be either freely distributed or sold by an entity other than the original vendor of the development platform.”All Windows users left mouse click on the “Start Button”, let you mouse hover over all programs, when icons and folders appear left mouse button click on accessories, then left mouse button click on system tools.Inside that directory you will see a lot of Microsoft programs in particular programs to help you keep your computer or system working properly. Disk clean up, disk defragmenter, a backup program (Windows XP Users(Windows XP Home users no backup) ), Vista and Windows 7 the backup can be found in the control panel or just type backup in the search window inside the start button.

Your major brand name computer may have bundled some of the same features.In some instances will ask you to pay for them if not already incorporated into the cost of the computer.Other examples are programs that are for sale to help improve your computer performance in most cases it will run disk cleanup and disk defragmenter. A certain virus 360 protection program that uses disk clean up, disk defragmenter to improve computer performance and data backup; and you pay extra for it too.This is truly redundant.

The most common third party programs are Web Browser programs.Mozilla Fire Fox once known as Netscape Navigator, Safari a Macintosh web browser now can be used in the Windows environment, Google Chrome to mention a few.A lot of time went into the development of web browsing the first widely used web browser was NCSA Mosaic (National Center for Supercomputer Applications). The Mosaic programming team then created the first commercial web browser called Netscape Navigator, later renamed Communicator, then renamed back to just Netscape. The Netscape browser led in user share until Microsoft Internet Explorer (IE) took the lead in 1999 due to its distribution advantage.A free open source software version of Netscape was then developed called Mozilla, which was the internal name for the old Netscape browser, and released in 2002. Mozilla has since gained in market share, particularly on non-Windows platforms, largely due to its open source foundation, and in 2004 was released in the quickly popular FireFox version.Surf the net and find out more about your computer.

Internet Explorer (IE) a web browser by Microsoft which allows the user to browse to Mozilla.com and download Firefox, a web browser.(In case you did not get it this is a small example of redundancy.)

I hope to accomplish that you know you are smarter than your computer, that the computer is a tool, and you are the master of that tool.If you have any questions you would like answered in this column please send them to: mouse@pc-s4u.com

Until next month, safe computing. “PC’S 4 U where quality and client satisfaction are priority!”